Guru Oriented Life – The Divine Life Society

Sri Swami Chidananda

This article is a chapter from the book Daily Swadhyaya.

The devotee who has devotion and reverence for God tries his level best to live his life in accordance with the will of God; he does not go contrary to the will of God. Reverence and devotion cannot coexist with contrariness to His will, at the same time in the same person. If there is reverence, there is obedience. If there is reverence, there is the attempt to carry out His will in thought, word and deed. If we say that we revere and do not do this, then it means that there is something wrong. There is an essential inner contradiction.

Similarly with the guru. Our life should be guru-oriented. Our life should be a life of harmony with his will and teaching. That would be therefore the way we express our reverence for the guru. And that we should do daily. We should live a guru-oriented life in close accordance with the teachings to us, not only daily but also every hour from morning till night.

If you revere some being, you would also wish to carry out his instructions and orders, the way that he wants to walk you to walk, the way that he has shown by his teachings as well as by his living. The genuine manner of showing reverence in a practical way would be to live in accordance with his will, and not contrary to it.

We must be aware that this orientation in our life is one of the essential ingredients of discipleship. We may even say that it is the essence of discipleship. Then indeed all blessings will be ours. Then indeed day by day we will proceed and progress towards the Goal. The guru’s teachings will find fulfilment in the disciple’s living, and all blessedness will follow. We must sincerely, earnestly and diligently strive to this end without ceasing. Our supreme good and highest welfare lies in this.

May the divine grace of the Supreme and benedictions of the guru enable us to do so and live so! May God and Gurudev’s grace and blessings enable you to do so most effectively, most fully, for the benefit of all humanity!